CNN, ABC Call "Bull" on Obama Ad

Watching Anderson Cooper on CNN last night, I saw an interesting piece on an ad Senator Obama is running against John McCain. CNN was particularly critical of the ad, calling it dead wrong, not factual, and way out of context. And it seems CNN is not the only news organization calling "bull" on Obama's new Spanish-language television ad.

ABC's Jake Tapper did a blog post on this subject yesterday, saying, "There are some real factual problems with this ad, which is titled 'Dos Caras,' or two faces." Tapper explains: "First of all, tying Sen. McCain - especially on the issue of immigration reform - to Limbaugh is unfair. Limbaugh opposed McCain on that issue. Vociferously. And in a larger sense, it's unfair to link McCain to Limbaugh on a host of issues since Limbaugh, as any even occasional listener of his knows, doesn't particularly care for McCain."

"Second," Tapper says, "the quotes of Limbaugh's are out of context. Railing against NAFTA in 1993, Limbaugh said, 'If you are unskilled and uneducated, your job is going south. Skilled workers, educated people are going to do fine 'cause those are the kinds of jobs NAFTA is going to create. If we are going to start rewarding no skills and stupid people, I'm serious, let the unskilled jobs that take absolutely no knowledge whatsoever to do - let stupid and unskilled Mexicans do that work."

The Obama ad only shows Limbaugh saying "...stupid and unskilled Mexicans," and "You shut your mouth or you get out!" As Tapper explains, "Not one of his most eloquent moments, to be sure, but his larger point was that NAFTA would mean that unskilled stupid Mexicans would be doing the jobs of unskilled stupid Americans. I'm not going to defend how he said it, but to act as if this was just a moment of Limbaugh slurring Mexicans is not accurate."

Next, Tapper says in reference to the second quote, "In 2006 Limbaugh was mocking an actual Mexican law..." that says foreigners need to keep their mouths shut or get out of the country. Tapper also notes that McCain has changed his immigration stance, which could be considered flip-flopping, but that "...the Obama campaign is quoting his selectively and unfairly to make their points." Tapper closes by saying, "...the Obama campaign has crossed a line into misleading the viewers of its new TV ad. In Spanish, the word is erroneo."

CNN also pointed out last night that Obama has spent more on negative advertising in the past week than has McCain. I expect it will only get uglier from here on out.